Advanced vehicle communication approaches have been used to develop “platooned” vehicle groups, where a group of vehicles travels in a platoon on the highway under automatic control. Such vehicles utilize communication between the vehicles, where there is typically a lead vehicle that transmits its speed, acceleration, desired traveling distance between vehicles, and other data to the other vehicles in the platoon. The trailing vehicles use this information, along with other measured data, to maintain the platoon under desired conditions. Such platoons attempt to increase highway throughput by utilizing automatic control.
However, the inventors herein have recognized a disadvantage with such an approach. For example, platooned vehicles may require significant regulation, and thus, the rate of implementation may be rather low. However, the inventors herein have also recognized that communication from one vehicle to another under less stringent requirements may be readily used with the given state of technology, and in particular, road surface information that may be used in traction control vehicles may be particularly useful to other vehicles.
In one example, a first vehicle traveling on a road may comprise: a communication device coupled in the first vehicle configured to receive information transmitted by a second vehicle traveling on the road, said information identifying road surface conditions experience by said second vehicle; and a controller configured to adjust a vehicle operating parameter of the first vehicle in response to receiving said transmitted information from said second vehicle.
In this way, for example, it is possible to utilize the information to improve vehicle performance on variable friction surfaces, without having to first identify the variation in friction.